TANTRIC-QUEST-Encounter-with-Absolute-Love

eing hit by a lot of stones, he'd calm down, but as soonas he recovered he'd start harassing us again. As for thosewho believed in the idea of Self, of consciousness as receptacle,he'd shout into their ears that only non-Selfwas supreme. As for those who clung to the idea of non-Self, he threatened to carve the consciousness to bits witha knife for them and find the Buddha there. He walkedaround with a large Tibetan knife, which he took out ofa silver case on which the image of a dragon was engraved.Soon he was called 'Dragon.' Since he was botheringthe ascetics, one of them proposed that we shouldmeet together, and according to the ancient tradition,we should debate the question of Self and non-Self, onthe condition that following the debate, Dragon wouldretire quietly into a cave and not trouble the asceticsanymore. Dragon accepted this proposition and saw tohawking the news of it in such a way that precisely thosewho weren't going to go along with the debate were hisconstant victims. Thus, on the chosen day, twenty-threeascetics found themselves on the knoll where the debatewas to take place. According to ancient custom, the opposingsides faced each other: in one line, the partisansof Self; in the other, the partisans of non-Self. OnlyDragon constantly switched sides. The debate beganunenthusiastically. Then, with the skill of the argumentsand the richness of the supporting citations, thingswarmed up, and it became a real debate. It's said that inancient times the loser in a philosophical debate wasput to death or exiled. In the scriptures, there are numerousallusions to these duels, which sometimeschanged the destiny of a kingdom, as in Tibet, where89